Ben Carson Wisecracks: Many Americans ‘Are Stupid’ (VIDEO)

Dr. Ben Carson speaks at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library on Oct. 19, 2015.
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Dr. Ben Carson, a retired neurosurgeon, joked last year during a book tour that many Americans “are stupid.”

Mother Jones on Tuesday flagged the remark from Carson’s Oct. 19, 2014 speech at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library. After an audience member asked Carson about running as an independent—Carson said he wouldn’t “want to fracture” the GOP by doing so—the retired neurosurgeon referred to an ambiguous “they” who he accused of infiltrating the American media and school system with the goal of “fundamentally changing this nation.”

“Everything was perfect. Except they underestimated the intelligence of the American people,” Carson said. “The people are not as stupid as they think they are.”

“Many of them are stupid, okay,” he added to laughs from the audience. “But I’m talking about overall.”

Carson also credited social media and Fox News with enabling him to spread his message outside of the mainstream media.

“Even if all the media tries to shut you down—which they have tried very much to do with me,” he said. “But they can’t because the good Lord has provided me with mechanisms like my syndicated column and like Fox News. We’d be Cuba if there were no Fox News.”

Watch below at the 17:45 mark:

This post has been updated to clarify that Carson joked “many” Americans are stupid.

Notable Replies

  1. “The person is smart. People are dumb, panicky, dangerous animals.”

    And, Dr. Carson, I have an incredibly advanced intellect, and even I know it isn’t acceptable to call the majority of the American people stupid.

  2. He didn’t call Americans stupid.

    But what he did do is reveal some of the seriously paranoid crap that he actually believes in. “They” are coming to get you. He buys into some seriously crazy shit about a Marxist conspiracy at all levels of America. Stuff that is so far out there it would make McCarthy blush.

  3. “We’d be Cuba if there were no Fox News.”

    This is the place i would normally write words about what i had just read, but this comment will have to wait until i can get my jaw off the floor.

  4. Avatar for edhedh edhedh says:

    yes, ben, there are plenty stupid americans and they are the ones that find you appealing. you, on the other hand, have shown massive ignorance over a wide range of topics.

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